A conventional computer which carries out a plurality of virtual machines allocates different Media Access Control address (MAC) addresses to virtual LAN interfaces for the respective virtual machines, virtually connects the LAN-interfaces by a virtual bridge or a virtual switch, and sorts the interfaces for transmission/reception ends by the transmission/reception MAC addresses thereamong. When the destination MAC address of a packet received from one physical LAN interface is a broadcast, the packet is received by the LAN interfaces of all the virtual machines. When the destination MAC address is a unicast, the packet is received by the LAN interfaces of the virtual machines having the same MAC address.
In order to set MAC addresses totally different from one another, predetermined MAC addresses are set, or MAC addresses are selected from a specified range and used when MAC addresses are dynamically generated. Therefore, IP addresses that are uniquely determined by the MAC addresses of the respective virtual machines are also different from one another. When a client PC is virtualized, a plurality of MAC addresses and a plurality of IP addresses are required. Thus, a large number of client PCs lead to the shortage of IP addresses.
An address translation scheme provides a plurality of MAC addresses, uses one common representative IP address, and internally allocates and uses local IP addresses. According to this address translation scheme, some protocols are not compatible with the address translation, and there is a limit to network protocols that can be used.
When a plurality of virtual machines are carried out by a computer (information processing apparatus), it is desired to hold down the number of MAC addresses and IP addresses used by the computer.